MANDI 2015

Flagship Event of M.A.C. Experiential Marketing association of IIM Calcutta

(formerly Team Census)

Introduction
Mandi is the flagship event of M.A.C., Experiential Marketing Association of IIM Calcutta. Event gives a
full-fledged marketing experience to the participants and is the most sought after event on the campus.
The rules and procedure of application for the event is given below.

Round 1 (Deadline: 17 Sep 2015)

1. Form a team of 6 to 8 members.
2. The team can have only current students from the institute.
3. Participants should choose a product that they are going to sell in Mandi if they are through to
the second round. The product should not be a brand of any company but it should be a brand
that they would build for this contest.
4. Participants can choose any product (food or non-food category) but the restriction is that if a
team chooses a food category product then the weightage of profit in the evaluation if the food
category is selected would be less than non-food category.
Weightage factor: food category 0.85, non food category 1.00
5. Non-food category products can be anything from physical products to the entertainment
services.
6. Participants have to prepare a document of not more than two pages defining the mini business
plan for the product and their branding and marketing strategy over the period of the event Mandi
2015.
7. The document should briefly define the branding of the product and the product specification.
8. In addition to product specifications, the document should have the marketing strategy that the
team is going to use for the promotion of the product using STP or other frameworks.
9. Document should also have the necessary financials that help us in assessing the product
performance. The financials can be assumed according to the facts that they can get from the
market and also the demand that they can have in IIM Calcutta at the time of event. Assume
footfall of ~1500 for the same.
10. The document should reach us through mail at mac@email.iimcal.ac.in by 17th September 2015.
The subject of the email should be Mandi 2015 Entry
11. Evaluation by the IIM Calcutta faculty would be carried out and teams would be shortlisted for
the further rounds.

Round 2 - Promotions
1. The shortlisted team for the second round will be informed through mail and will be informed of
further rounds.
 2. All qualifying teams would be required to pay a security deposit of Rs. 1,000/- This amount will be
refunded at end of event; provided teams have setup their stalls at Mandi.
3. 2nd round would start on 20th Sep and teams can start promoting their product through different
media.
4. Every team will be assigned a team liaison from M.A.C. who will act as part of the team and will
be keeping track of all the activities of the team.
5. Ambush marketing For Mandi 2015, special focus is given to Ambush marketing. The rules
regarding the same are as below:
4.1 Ambush marketing is applicable only for online promotions.
4.2 Content has to be focused only on competitor promotional campaigns; attacks on persons
comprising the team is not allowed. Defaulters will be dealt with severely, ranging from fines
to disqualification.
4.3 Use of abusive language or profanity in any form is strongly discouraged and can lead to
disqualification from the competition.
4.4 It is not necessary to take part in ambush marketing. However, teams would be losing out on
the points allotted for same. View evaluation for more details.
4.5 Teams from IIM Calcutta and outside teams are allowed to undertake ambush marketing.
4.6 Links to give an idea about real world ambush marketing campaigns

https://www.kulzy.com/just-like-that/?id=110&event=xy

http://www.engadget.com/2013/03/14/lg-trolls-samsungs-times-square-billboards-with-optimus-g-4-a/

6. The evaluation process for the teams for IIM Calcutta and the outside teams would be different
as the promotional abilities for both would be different.
7. IIM Calcutta Teams
6.1 All the teams can actively have their online promotions and there will be no restrictions on
those promotions.
6.2 Teams have to send their plans for offline promotions; including location, activity planned,
timeline planned. This is critical so that permissions from the PGP office can be taken for the
same and also to ensure that planned activities are within the allowable bounds as dictated
by our institute.
6.3 In case multiple teams plan to use same location, an auction will be conducted for these
locations.
6.4 The auction will be held on 21st /22nd Sep evening at a suitable time. Teams would auction on
the percentage of profits they would give to the club after the event.
6.5 The evaluation of offline promotion would be done by faculty of IIM Calcutta and online would
be dealt in the later part of the doc.
8. Outside Teams
7.1 Outside teams can have online promotions through the liaisons they have from the club.
7.2 Liaison will be part of the team from the beginning to the end of the event and it would a
great opportunity for the teams to be able to reach out to their target customers.
7.3 Teams can have offline promotions from one day before the actual event as they cannot visit
campus daily since the start of the 2nd round.
 7.4 The rules of auctioning locations for offline promotions apply to outside teams as well. (refer
points 6.2, 6.3)
7.5 The online promotion evaluation would be same as it is done for the on campus teams and
will be discussed in the evaluation part of the doc.

Round 3
1. After all the above activities, the part which is discussed below would be the most important and the
most weighted part of the event.
2. After all the promotion part of the product, the participating teams should sell their products in the
stalls setup by club.
3. There will be an auction of the stalls that we set up according to the position and size of the stall.
4. A day before the actual event, the teams should participate in auction of stalls and the auction will be
based on the monetary value.
5. For evaluation, net profits would be considered i.e, after accounting for expenses incurred in auctions
for stalls and offline promotion space.
6. The price of the product is fixed by the participation team and a fixed service tax will be added to that
price of the product which will be taken by M.A.C.
7. The participants will be given 5hrs to sell their products in the stall from 5PM to 10PM.
8. The team liaisons will keep track of all the promotional and material investments that the teams will
make before the 2nd round.
9. All the transactions will be on the virtual money that is the property of M.A.C. and the POCs from the
club will be keeping track of all the sales of the team.
10. Final prices may need to be slightly modified to suit virtual currency denominations. Decision for same
will be based on mutual discussion and agreement between teams and the club as required.

Evaluation
Evaluation will be done as below:

Profits 60% weightage

o includes different weightage factors for food, non food category. Factor of 0.85 for food
& 1.00 for non food
o net profits after deducting expenses of auctions (stall & offline promotion space) will be
considered for evaluation
Offline promotions 15% weightage
Online promotions 25% weightage (~10% weightage for ambush marketing campaigns
undertaken by teams and their responses etc)

Conclusion
After all the rounds, the teams will be evaluated on three different parameters namely profits, online
promotions and offline promotions. The teams will be notified of the results through our website and
mails. The decision of the evaluators would be final in the final results of the events. There will be two
winners one from IIM Calcutta and other from other colleges to give fair chance to other colleges due to
lack of opportunity to carry out offline promotions.

Contact Details
If you have any queries regarding the event,

Email: mac@email.iimcal.ac.in
Website: www.mac-iimc.in

Or you can also contact,

Samapt Duttai Overall coordinator, Mandi 2015; Head-Infrastructure, M.A.C.

Mobile: +918585010312, Email: samaptid2016@email.iimcal.ac.in
Ankit Kumpawat Co Head-Events, M.A.C.
Mobile: +918420817351, Email: ankitk2016@email.iimcal.ac.in

Gaurav Agarwal President, M.A.C.

Mobile: +91858010135, Email: gauravag2016@email.iimcal.ac.in